Because people enjoy riding bicycles in a variety of locations, it is often necessary to transport a bicycle by a vehicle such as a car. In many cases, however, the bicycle will not fit inside the vehicle. Even if the bicycle does fit into the vehicle, the bicycle takes up a lot of interior or trunk space and may make it uncomfortable for the passengers. Therefore, it is often desirable to carry a bicycle on the exterior of a vehicle. Many bicycle carriers have been designed which transport bicycles on the exterior of a vehicle. One general classification of bicycle carriers encompasses rooftop mounted bicycle carriers. The two most common rooftop bicycle carriers are the fork-mount bicycle carrier and the upright bicycle carrier.
In the fork-mount bicycle carrier the front wheel of the bicycle must be removed so that the front wheel forks can be mounted and secured into a holding device. The rear wheel remains attached to the bicycle and is secured to the bicycle carrier using a wheel holding device.
In the upright bicycle carrier the bicycle can be mounted to the carrier without removing the front wheel. Therefore, the bicycle is in a ride-ready condition when it is removed from the carrier. In this carrier design, both the front and rear wheels are secured to the bicycle carrier using wheel holding devices. The bicycle is further stabilized using a support arm that engages a part of the bicycle. One such design being used today engages the front down tube of the bicycle frame. Another design is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,435,475, entitled "Ride-Ready Bike Carrier System," which is assigned to the Assignee of the present application. In the invention disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,435,475, the support arm attaches to a combination of the bicycle frame and rear wheel axle.
Both of these types of rooftop bicycle carriers, while useful in certain situations, have some design features which are not optimal in other situations. For example, use of the fork-mount bicycle carrier is considered by some to be inconvenient and time consuming because the front wheel of the bicycle must be removed to mount the bicycle to the carrier and then the front wheel must be reinstalled when the bicycle is removed from the carrier.
Existing upright carriers have disadvantages as well. One drawback to the upright carriers which engage the front down tube is that the support arm used to secure the front down tube is designed to hold a traditionally-shaped cylindrical tube. Many of the newer bicycle frame designs utilize non-cylindrical shapes for the front down tube of the bicycle frame. A different, custom designed, support arm is required every time a bicycle of differing shape needs to be mounted on an upright bicycle carrier. This drawback limits the compatibility of this type of carrier to hold different shaped bicycle frames.
Although the upright bicycle carrier which engages the frame and rear wheel axle combination, described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,435,475, allows compatibility with various frame shapes and wheel sizes, it requires an adjustment of the support arm location to hold bicycles of differing wheel size. In addition, this bicycle carrier requires the attachment of at least two fasteners to secure the support arm. One fastener, a U-clamp, engages the combination of the bicycle frame and rear wheel axle and another fastener, a cone adjuster nut, engages the end of the rear wheel axle.